


but joined are unafraid

by simplycarryon



Category: Pyre (Video Game)
Genre: Disabled Reader, Fluff, Gen, basically everyone loves the Reader and the Reader loves everyone, someday we will have unified character tags but today is not that day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-07
Updated: 2017-08-07
Packaged: 2018-12-12 07:03:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11731974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/simplycarryon/pseuds/simplycarryon
Summary: As the stars burn overhead, illuminating your path ever onward, it begins to sink in just howlonga journey this is meant to be.





	but joined are unafraid

**Author's Note:**

> we don't really get a good grasp of how big the Downside is just while exploring it, but there's a line before the first Liberation Rite that references the "many thousand leagues" you crossed to reach this point.

As the stars burn overhead, illuminating your path ever onward, it begins to sink in just how _long_ a journey this is meant to be. 

Fitting, perhaps, considering what you know of redemption—that the road to atonement is never meant to be an easy one—but the great expanse between you and the End stretches on for an eternity, and you must walk it yourself, one halting footstep at a time.

You weren’t meant for such a journey, you realize; this Path, these Rites, they were built to test the limits of strength you do not possess. Your legs—carved wood and cool brass from just below the knee—could never carry you through the rigors the Rites demand. Did the Scribes see no value in those such as you, you wonder; is the physical nature of the Rites a stroke of ancient and resounding cruelty? Or have you merely been overlooked, as you so often have been, in the farsighted vision of those who came before?

It gives you thought. Something to digest as you trudge alongside the rattling Blackwagon, having found your gait in the unrelenting heat of Jomuer Valley.

(Walking may be painful, but you and your companions have decided that it’s better, now and then, than the stifling boredom and stiff joints that come with riding in the Blackwagon for long stretches of your journey.)

Hedwyn forms the vanguard of your little caravan, mapping out the land as the wagon clatters along behind him. Mae bounds beside you, Scribes bless her, chattering about a glittering jade-beetle she found nestled in the sand. It sits on her shoulder now, and she’s named it Rukey Greenwings, much to the real Rukey’s amusement. And Jodariel, ever watchful, serves as your rearguard. If something tries to catch you by surprise, you know full well she will destroy it without giving it a second thought.

It’s comforting, in a way that still gives you a thrill of—fear? adrenaline? delight?—when you meet her sharp-eyed gaze.

Which you have no time to do, at the moment, so focused are you on the ever-more-daunting task of keeping your footing.

The sand you walk in saps your strength more than you’d like to admit, shortening your strides and shifting perilously beneath your cane; slowly but surely, the heat bleaches you of your will to place one foot in front of the other. 

And then, suddenly, the will is gone entirely.

And you fall.

It’s little surprise to you that Jodariel is at your side in an instant, considering how ready she is to swoop down on any sign of trouble, and you suppose a Reader collapsing in a heap is trouble enough.

You insist that you’re fine, that you merely missed a step, Scribes curse your useless legs. But she huffs and scoops you up—an act for which you have no protest, and one which sends that thrill down your spine again, a sudden dousing in ice water—and carries you to the shade of the halted Blackwagon.

“Enough,” she says, as the others gather around you. There is a softness in her voice that you have not heard before, even as she frowns and checks you over. “My apologies, Reader. This place drains your strength as it is, and you have only just recovered from your trip down the river.”

You remind her, again, that you are _fine._ But her gentle touch soothes, an oasis in a barren wasteland.

“We’ve still a ways to go before we can make camp, but we can at least ride in the shade for a while.” Hedwyn, merciful Hedwyn, brings you a shallow bowl filled with cool water; you drink, feeling life trickle back into you with every mouthful, and he steadies you with an arm around your shoulders. “Forgive me for not realizing sooner that you needed rest.”

Rukey digs a trinket out of his bag, dropping it in your palm—a glass teardrop, cold to the touch, a source of blessed relief pressed to your forehead. “Rest easy, sister. You carried us through the Rite—let us carry you for a bit, yeah?”

“If you need anything, anything at all, I can find it for you, I can!” Mae adds, her hand on yours, red eyes bright. “I am very good at finding, except, except perhaps when I’m not, but when I do it for someone else I am much better at it, I think.”

Your heart aches.

You aren’t sure why.

But your fellow exiles gather around you, and you feel—accepted. Valued.

_Loved._

You blink furiously, trying to keep the tears at bay as the realization sets in, rising in your chest, tugging at your throat. Tears are pointless. You’ve lost enough water to sweat today, you berate yourself, pressing the heels of your hands against your eyes as if to stop up the flow before you drown in it.

Sensing your sudden emotional implosion, Jodariel ruffles your hair with one hand before getting up to instruct the drive-imps to start the wagon again. The others move to fill the space she leaves, drawing in around you, keeping the world at bay.

You have so far to go, still. And it’s not a journey you could ever make by yourself.

And yet, here, huddled together—you are the furthest thing from alone.


End file.
